How to enable emoticons in iOS 7

To use emoticons and dozens of cute icons on your iPhone and iPad, you don’t need to install any apps. Neither you have to jailbreak your device. In iOS 7 and earlier version of mobile operating system, iOS 6, there is a special keyboard called Emoji. It enables you to natively use special symbols, and it can be activated in a matter of several taps on the screen. We have prepared a simple guide on how to enable emoticons in iOS 7.

Emoticons in iOS 7. Meet Emoji keyboard

Emoji are cute little pictograms which originated from Japan. Apple included support for them in its iOS mobile platform. All you need to use Emoji is to enable additional keyboard in Settings.app. Use the steps below to enable emoticons in iOS. You can click on any image to enlarge.

Step 1: Open settings app and proceed to General section.

General section of Settings.app

Step 2: Scroll down to Keyboard section.

Open settings app, then tap on General

Step 3: Open Keyboards submenu.

Scroll to and tap on Keyboards

Step 4: Tap on “Add New Keyboard…”.

Click on Add New Keyboard…

Step 5: Find Emoji in the list.

Find and tap on Emoji

Thus you have enabled additional keyboard layout for smileys. You can use the symbols in any application. Switching keyboard is done the usual way – by tapping on the globe icon in keyboard.

Select Emoji from keyboards list to use emoticons

Emoticons are cross platform. Enjoy!

Emoji emoticons are mostly cross-platform. That means, you can safely send an Emoji emoticon in WhatsApp or other messaging apps to users of different platforms, i.e. Android or Windows Phone.